Evaluation of the effects of changes in regulatory policies on consumers perception: the case of designations of origin in the wine common market organisation

The paper analyses how different aspects connected with regulations can influence theconsumers’ quality perception and the value that consumers attribute to the wine sectorproducts. In particular, aspects concerning labelling and presentation of designations of origin,which, in turn, mirror different regulations of production methods, are considered. Consumers’preference can allow enterprises to complying with more restrictive rules and sustain highercosts for differentiate their products and achieve higher quality. When choosing a product,consumers do not evaluate each single quality factor but the product as a whole, therefore theanalysis has to be done with a methodology considering both the combination of allcharacteristics of the product, and the contribution of every factor to the creation of value forconsumers. For this reason the value that consumers attribute to different characteristics isevaluated through an experimental economic analysis applying the method of the Conjointanalysis.